Yard Turkey

So there it was, the end of the Halloween season. My previous yard decoration, a giant spider made out of wood, was scheduled to be disassembled. Fortunately, I was able to spend the entire Halloween weekend with my family. The downside is that I had to get underway right after the weekend and miss my wife’s birthday for about the 6th or 7th time since we’ve been married. Big Thanks to the Navy for that. In any case, I got back on the following Friday and had to make a decision as to what to do with the giant spider living in the front yard. Jokingly, I suggested to my wife that we create a giant turkey with the structure that was already in place for the spider. Since she has a creative ability ten times of my own, she jumped all over the idea. My condition was if she could design it, I would make the necessary adjustments to the yard statue.

Skip ahead to a few weekends spent under the cover of rain and miserable weather. It’s amazing what you fail to accomplish when you try to plan around the weather in Southern California sometimes. Finally I had the opportunity to make some progress on the Yard Turkey, and I had to move quickly because of the shortened days of Fall/Winter. The only real alteration that I needed to make to the creature in the front yard was the addition of a feather spread behind the body and a head for the beast. After an hour of cutting shapes out of wood and the application of a few cans of spray paint, the turkey began to take shape. A few more days to collect and assemble the final pieces, and Yard Turkey was born.

The best part of making something like this in the yard is that it is ridiculous and awesome at the same time. I’ve joked with my wife while looking at the wooden fowl in the front yard and say, “Yard Turkey judges you…” I sense a trend building in my front yard. Perhaps I should look into getting a charge account at Home Depot so I can make even bigger and better creations.